Alexander And Immortality

Alexander the Great was in search to find something which can make him immortal. Everybody is in search of something like that, and when Alexander is in search, he will find it — he was such a powerful man.

He searched and searched, and once he reached to the cave where some wise man has told him that, “If you drink the water of that cave — there is a stream in the cave — you will become immortal.”

Alexander must have been foolish. All Alexanders are foolish, otherwise he should have asked the wise man whether he had drunk from that stream or not. He didn’t ask; he was in such a hurry. And who knows? — He may not be able to reach the cave, and before he dies… so he rushed.

He reached to the cave. Inside it, he was very happy: crystal clear the water was there; he had never seen such water. And he was going to drink the water… suddenly a crow who was sitting in the cave said, “Stop! Don’t do it. I have done and I am suffering.”

Alexander looked at the crow and said, “What are you saying? You have drunk, and what is the suffering?”

The crow said, “Now I cannot die and I want to die. Everything is finished. I have known everything that life can give. I have known love and I have grown out of it. And I have known success; I was a king of crows, and now I am fed up, and I have known everything that can be known. And everybody I knew has died; they have gone back to rest, and I cannot rest. I have tried all efforts to commit suicide, but everything fails. I cannot die because I have drunk from this condemned cave. It is better that nobody knows about it. Before you drink, you meditate on my condition — and then you can drink.”

It is said that Alexander for the first time thought about it, and came back without drinking from that cave and that stream.

Life will be simply unbearable if there is no death. Love will be unbearable if there is no opposite. The whole thing will become so monotonous, it will create boredom. Life exists with the opposites — that’s why it is so interesting. Light is meaningful when darkness co-exist. Imagine if you do not get to see night for many years, imagine if you do not get to see the beautiful sunrise every morning for many years. When opposite doesn’t exist, subject matter loses its sheen and life. And that’s true with the life as well.